“Can’t you understand? I’ve been stood upon my head. The worry about you on one side and the contact with my father on the other would be 186 sufficient. But Cunningham and this pirate crew as a tail to the kite! But, thank God, I had the wit to come in search of you!”
“I thank God every minute, Denny! You are very strong,” she added, shyly.
“Glad of that, too. But I repeat, I’ve lost the parlour varnish and the art of parlour talk. For seven years I’ve been wandering in strange places, most of them hard; so I say what I think and act on the spur. That dog had liquor on his breath. Is Cunningham secretly letting them into the dry-stores?”
“The man may have brought it aboard at Shanghai. What a horrible thing a great war is! In a week it knocks aside all the bars of restraint it took years to erect. Could a venture like this have happened in 1913? I doubt it. There comes your father. But who is the man with him? He’s been hurt.”
“Father’s watchdog. They had to beat him up to get his gun away from him. That was the racket we heard. Evidently Father expects you to read to him, so I’ll take a constitutional.”
“Why, where’s your uniform?” she cried.
“Laid it aside. From now on it will be stuffy. Those military boots were killing me. I borrowed the rig from one of the pirates, but I’ll have to go barefoot.” 187
“Will you come to your chair soon? I shall worry otherwise. You might run into that man again.”
“I shan’t go below,” he promised, starting off.
Twenty thousand at compound interest for seven years, he thought, as he made the first turn. A tidy sum to start life with. Could he swallow his pride? And yet what hope was there of making a real living? He had never specialized in anything, and the world was calling for specialists and discarding the others. Another point to consider: Foot-loose for seven years, could he stand the shackles of office work, routine, the sameness day in and day out? He was returning to the States without the least idea what he wanted to do; that was the disturbing phase of it. If only he were keen for something! A typical son of the rich man. The only point in his favour was that he had not spent his allowances up and down Broadway. No, he would never touch a dollar of that money. That was final.